Nokia Bell Labs said its first network on the Moon was live for 25 minutes
The nordic vendor will return in 2027
Nokia told us that the work will aid with building tricky private networks and other difficult projects like mines, offshore oil rigs and more
Nokia Bell Labs' Moon missions will help the Nordic telecom infrastructure giant tackle some of its most tricky cellular private network projects, Thierry Klein, president of Nokia Bell Labs research, told us during a 100-year celebration of the research facility in New Jersey on Wednesday.
Klein said that the miniaturization of the network (a.k.a. a network-in-a-box) and the compact integration of hardware and software that Nokia had built for its Moon mission with Intuitive Machines in March — and missions to come — will also have an impact on private network projects on Earth.
“This is probably the smallest, lowest weight size cellular all-in-one...and that’s beneficial for mines, offshore oil rigs, remote wind farms, any industrial, public safety, or emergency response, anytime where you want to deploy a network quickly [and] remotely,” he said.
One small step
Regular readers will recall that Nokia has already taken a small step so far onto the Moon’s surface as part of the IM-2 mission in early March 2025.
Unfortunately, Intuitive Machine's Athena lander came down on its side on the lunar surface, which meant that it could not extend its solar panels and draw enough power for a phone call — or any of its other planned expeditions on Mons Mouton, a lunar mountain. Despite Athena's ill-fated landing, Nokia said it did have a network that worked on the Moon, albeit briefly.
“We had a fully operational cellular network,” Klein said. “It operated for 25 minutes [that] was based on the amount of power we’d be given,” he added.
One giant leap
Fear not, there are more lunar missions in store. Nokia is already working with Axiom Space to equip next-gen space suits with 4G LTE connectivity. These suits will be used on NASA's Artemis III mission in April 2027. And there are long-term plans for a sustained lunar presence.
Of course, people like Elon Musk want to bypass the Moon and aim for Mars but that's a long trip - 2 or 3 years - for a crewed mission to even reach the red planet. Let alone land a crew — and bring them back.
Listen to our podcast with Thierry Klein here: Podcast: Nokia Bell Labs exec details Moon mission, more